The Delicate Art of Deconstruction

I'm sorry that I'm not sorry that I've been quiet in recent days. You can find me in the mo(u)rning rhythm of the sun rising over Maplewood Park, as I walk the trail around the lake. Hands in my pockets and head in the sky, silent in the deconstruction of all I once held true.

The compartmentalization of systematic theology, dispensations of time to explain how God works, and a myriad of answers to questions that nobody was asking... I used to have an answer for you! I had a chapter and verse memorized for apologetical discourse on all things controversial. I was sharp with the tongue, and witty with the sarcasm, and angry with the liturgy. I had a vision for perishing people, a prophetic identity, and a zealous mission! I had adopted the 7-Steps, constructed grids and formulas for spiritual formation, and constructed a bridge between justice and mercy. 

The bridge I once constructed is now in ashes. The flames singed, the branches burned; beyond the point of no return. The chapter I'm reading is being written in a heavenly language, and I never claimed to the have the gift of interpretation... it's become like clanging symbol, triggering flashbacks of a full theater, an audience of rowdy revolutionaries, and a power point presentation complete with historical context. In the center of it all was a fiery prophet without the character to sustain the charisma. I have been exposed as indecent, revealed as a hypocrite, and evicted from the circle I scribbled with a felt-tip marker on a napkin at Fazoli's.

My life has not turned out the way I thought it was going to. And now, on the evening before my 46th birthday, I wonder if this is what is meant by "Midlife Crisis"? Should I go out and buy a new Corvette or get a membership at the Country Club? As if material possessions can scratch a spiritual itch, we all know the Corvette would get wrapped around a tree, and I'd get banished from the Country Club, just like every other church in town. 

It's all so disorienting, isn't it? When the grids and boxes are decimated by a spiritual virus, and the politics create a culture of cancellation, until we're all drowning in a tsunami of white noise. 

The cosmic plot twist has shattered the foundation of the opening chapters. The narrative is being re-written with a nuclear grace, and the ink is leaking hope on every page. The revolution is being redefined: to love my family, and lead my daughters into a deeper understanding of God's immeasurable love. This is my Church. This is my unbroken circle. In the company of agape love, I am known and loved anyway. 

a hug on pause

 when i was twenty five years old i got lost in the manistee national forest in the middle of a snowstorm, i had a walkman with headphones and a cassette tape of jack hyles preaching a sermon from the old testament called "I Did Know Thee In the Wilderness" and i wandered down to the water's edge and fell asleep in the snowbank and i knew that my heart had been strangely warmed by the charcoal fire and the relentless invitation of my rabbi to come and die. 

remember when saturday nights were littt with atomic optimism as we broke break and studied the apostles teachings and dimmed the lights and sang our hearts out to delirious and the happy song and the tambourine didn't fall into the rhythm of the guitar but joel was spirit filled and jacob had his hands raised and mariah was an infant and we knew that the ceiling was glass and heaven was invading earth.

when i was in jail a thief stole my shoes. when i confronted him, he spit in my face. a crowd swarmed around and a fight was immanent. surely, this is my rock bottom. (what is yours?). but then a stranger approached the thief and interrupted the conflict. he said, "i remember jerry depoy jr, he once picked me up when i was hitchhiking and took me to the store and bought me food." and in that moment i recognized him as angel that i had unwittingly entertained a few months prior. 

when i was out on work release, i remember standing in the check-out lane at meijer. i was carrying a bag full of boxer shorts that i had planned to layer and smuggle back into the jail to distribute to my new friends whom had been wearing the same underwear since the day of their incarceration. while was standing in line i heard whispers and in my peripheral vision i could see the pointed fingers in my direction. bowing my head in toxic shame, i tried to avoid eye contact. when the cashier took my credit card she read the name. "Jerry DePoy Jr.? I remember you. You once came to us after our house had burned down and you took up an offering to collect resources for my children." she then walked around from behind the counter and gave me a hug. the kind of hug that kicks the bloody hell out of shame. 

[my givashitter broke three weeks ago]. 

The Awakening

Hidden beneath a blanket of snow, I noticed a plastic tarp. The city trucks had plowed the snow, and showered the sidewalks with the Polar Vortex, and the homeless huddled to keep warm. I crossed my arms, shivering to keep my bones warm as I walked along Division Avenue... The temperatures had plummeted beneath the full moon, and the streetlights revealed a pair of boots attached to a body curled without motion.

I stopped at the human lump beneath the tarp beneath the snow beneath the streetlight, and watched closely for any sign of life. "Hey, are you okay under there?"

No response.

I glanced to the north, and looked for any others. Only turn signals and brake lights greeted me, as a streetlight turned from yellow to red. The frigid temperature had kept most of the motorists off the road, and I found myself alone with a heavy heart.

"Hey" I tried again, this time with nudge. "Wake up."

I brushed the snow from the plastic tarp, and pulled it back to reveal an intoxicated man with a swollen eye. He blinked a few times and mumbled, "I'm alright." The stench of cheap whiskey permeated his breath, and when he finally locked eyes with mine, I could see cumulonimbus clouds threatening rain.

"No, you're not. This is not okay. You can't stay here. It's seven degrees." I brushed the snow off his shoulder and asked him if he was hungry. He shook his head and closed his eyes, perhaps wanting me to just leave him alone. I looked at my watch (almost midnight) and considered calling 911.

"You're going to die out here. I don't want you to die." I realized that he had made choices that burned a lot of bridges. I knew that there were resources available to help him, but his apparent addiction to alcohol had held him captive to this virus. The streets were his home, and this tarp was his castle.

"You're coming with me." I said. My car was parked a few blocks away, so I left briefly only to return with the passenger door open. I walked around to the sidewalk again and physically took his arm. He resisted at first, but I told him I was going to get him some food and shelter. He finally stood to his feet, and with wobbly knees stepped toward my vehicle. I helped him into the passenger seat, and buckled his seatbelt. He leaned his head back against the window, and closed his eyes as I did a U-Turn in the middle of Division Street.

The streetlight turned red, and I stopped accordingly. As I waited for the light to change, I looked over to the parking lot of an empty gas station... there beside the building, I saw two more people seeking shelter from the wind. A blue tent was getting battered by the wind, and they were struggling to stay warm. I pulled into the otherwise vacant parking lot, and I stepped out of the car.

As I approached them, they immediately asked for money. Although my instincts are negative, I realized that is exactly what I would have done if I were them! I didn't give them any cash, but I did offer to help them find shelter and food. "Come on, get in..."

So here I was, driving around downtown Grand Rapids with three homeless friends. I learned their names, and I listened to their incredulous stories. Love lost and found and lost again, heroes and villains, and prison and scars and the inability to find employment and the vicious cycle of addiction and recovery and relapse and bus passes and meal vouchers, and Jesus.

Everything inside of me wanted to lecture and fix their problems. It was very tempting to not give my scholarly insights and unsolicited advice. But during this season, I am learning to do more listening than talking; Jesus asked twice as many questions as he answered. I don't have all the answers, and I have never walked a mile in their shoes. I can't pretend to have been there...

But I am learning to listen. And I'm learning to coordinate my prayers with the rhythm of breathing. I am learning to inhale gratitude and exhale entitlement. I am very much still under reconstruction, but slowly being transformed into the image of beloved.

The Story Behind Your Scars

Beneath the surface of this bruise is a vein of backfiring blood running toward a resolution. You see only the external evidence of an internal eruption, but time will prove that bruises fade and scars become the everlasting witness of yesterday's choices.

Behind each scar is a story. Every inch of the journey has been recorded on the canvas of mortal flesh; Skinned knees, amputated appendages, and knuckles bleeding from the incessant knocking on the door of heaven, for mercy.

Hidden in the filter of your photoshopped existence is the Truth of bridges of torched by broken promises. The contract was conceived in distrust, but the covenant remains eternal. The smoke of Sinai still hovers over the commitment; the faithfulness of the I Am, when i am not.

Scars are tattoos with better stories. They are narratives written in blood, and the last chapter is still being written. Your story is unfinished. Do not let regret shame you into silence, because the hour is late and the time is now.

Own your story. It's the one thing they can't take away.

They can suffocate your dreams, revoke your license, and disqualify your ordination. They can pull the plug on your breathing machine, and spin the narrative into clean categories of black and white and us and them and right and wrong and pure and polluted. They lock you up in a prison of toxic shame, and write your epitaph with permanent markers. They can start the prayer chain and gatekeepers can sound the alarm of an enemy wolf among innocent sheep. The revisionists can deconstruct your His/Story and you can choose to allow them, [or]

You can let your scars become the evidence of a scandalous mercy that screams of a Creator who uses the foolish things of the world to shame the wise, and the weak things of the world to shame the strong. Don't hide your scars from your children. Reveal the ashes and reconstruct a better tomorrow. Lean into the dis-ease, and be vulnerable enough
to wake up, rise up, take up your bed and walk.

Regret and Gratitude

The other day I was sitting at a table with recovering addicts, listening to the exchange of life stories and mountains climbed. After hearing one man share about all of the bridges he's burned on his way toward sobriety, he stated emphatically, "... and if I could do it all over, I wouldn't have changed a thing! The life lessons have shaped who I am today!" Others around the table nodded, as if to agree.

But I could not.

Because the reality is that I live with an ocean of regret. It is like an albatross chained to my memory, haunting me in my sleep. It's like a reoccurring dream of bridges built and crossed and then burned to ashes by my indifference, neglect, and selfishness. I have sketched the blueprints of a hedonistic empire and chiseled at a foundation of meticulously broken promises.

I carry this weight in my heart, and it slows my pace. My heart beats faster than I can walk, and I'm slowly falling behind and the sun is setting and the hour is late and the course is unfinished and the faith has not been kept.

As I write this, the late winter rains have caused the river behind my house to overflow the banks. The Grand River is expected to continue to rise until water will invade my living room. Yesterday I lifted all of our valuable possessions, including photo albums full of memories. On the kitchen table there are pictures of a cocky teenager who was hellbent on self-destruction. I hate that kid! I want grab him by the throat and get his attention! I wish I could return to Muskegon and tell him to let go of the egocentric aggression, and the narcissistic self-absorption. If I could write an open letter to my younger self, I would emphasize a cautionary dis-trust of choices made with emotion.

There are two dominant streams in my life: Regret and Gratitude.

Regret is the monster hiding beneath the bed of shame. I regret the way I treated my teachers in high school. I regret the way I relentlessly teased Jeremy Leffring. I regret the way I disrespected the different girlfriends of my youth, and the way I pursued attention for vain glory. I regret the way I manipulated conversations to solicit false affirmation, and I regret trusting the promises of a thousand amens. I regret all of the lies that I told, in my efforts to maintain an empire of delusion.

I don't feel like God is angry with me. But I feel like He is disappointed. I don't expect lightning bolts of His wrath, but I have come to expect the icy chill of His silent treatment. The distance is tangible, and the indifference is palpable. I feel reinstated to His Table, but not necessarily to His Triumph.

But on the other side of this ocean of regret, is an oasis of gratitude. We are born with two lungs, and if I inhale from the lung of regret, then I exhale from the lung of gratitude. Because after all of the self-destruction and humiliation, I am still here. It is indeed a miracle!

Several years ago I was involved in a  horrifying car crash that should have ended my life. I was traveling northbound on US 31 near Lake Michigan when I mistakenly took my eyes off the highway. The construction ahead had slowed the traffic to a standstill, and I had no time to stop! I tried to swerve from hitting the last car stopped ahead of me, but clipped the corner of his bumper. My sedan shot fifteen feet into the air, rotating endoverendoverendoverend several times, landing upside down in the opposite direction of travel (across the median)! I was not wearing a safety belt, and my entire vehicle was shattered into a thousand pieces. One witness heard the sound of the crash and saw my vehicle flying through the air, inducing immediate vomit all of the interior of her own vehicle. Such was the disturbance in the atmosphere.

I remember bracing at the time of the collision, curling into the fetal position and waiting for death. I closed my eyes and braced for the darkness. "This is how it ends", I thought. But with each roll and spin and flip, I remained conscious. When I had come to a final stop (upside down), I crawled out of the passenger window and walked away without a scratch. I was barefoot because somehow my shoes went flying with the rest of the car. I just kept shaking my head thinking, "I can't believe I'm alive. I can't. Believe. I'm alive."

I am grateful. I am thankful that despite the crash and burn and fire and smoke and vomit and wonder - there is a Table spread before me in the presence of my enemies. I am grateful. I am thankful that despite my unworthiness, there is the love of a woman, the faith of a mother, and the laughter of three daughters who seal me in this promise of redemption. I am grateful. I am thankful that I have friends like Mitch Schultz, and John Smith, Ken and Bonnie Jane Greene, Dustin Price and Sulkiro Song, AJ Sherrill and Cam Speer, voices of truth in a world of counterfeit. I am grateful. I am thankful for a place to belong, a promise to believe, and a purpose to become. I am grateful. I am thankful for the invitation of the Mercy King to a Table of broken bread and wine in abundance.

Regret < Gratitude

"...It's a Cold and Broken, Hallelujah."

The carpet felt more like concrete, as I collapsed beneath the table and erupted into a violent explosion of salty tears and self-hatred. The world I had known was forever changed in the unraveling of my shame, finding a shattered mirror and a fist and a whisper, "wherever you go, there you are."

Find me here, inconsolable and unrecognizable. A blanket of suicidal thoughts and imaginary voices calling me to run run run from the truth, and hide hide hide from the runaway tongues. I called Jennifer, Janelle, and Jonathan to say, "I love you." But this felt like the end of a long journey and
I was coming home.

From the carpet beneath the table, I was physically lifted and carried by an angel with tattoos and blue jeans. He drove me home when I was -less, and became my feet when I could not walk. There were no words, only the sound of choppy breathing and hyperventilating and the crushing weight of anxiety as I began to devise a plan for my escape. It was early in the afternoon, and rain had set in while the mountains of Asheville had begun to shake off the frostbite of late winter.

Cam laid me on the couch in his living room, and I rolled over to continue sobbing. These groans were immodest and explicit, and my hands had begun to tingle from the lack of circulation. It seemed my heart had stopped beating, and I was not getting enough oxygen. I cried bitterly, as the rooster crowed thrice. I trembled violently, as my fists became numb. There were no words spoken, only the sound of uninterpretable tongues toward heaven, have mercy.

I don't know how long I slept there on that couch. It seemed like days, but when I stirred I was confused. Where was I? What happened? My eyes opened slowly and began to adjust to the falling daylight. It must have been dusk, and only the fading natural light remained to illuminate through the windows. I was paralyzed in the aftermath of all things unholy; the ashes no longer provided heat - only the evidence that a fire once burned.

And there, beside the couch, sat my friend. He was unmoved and focused, watching me quietly from his chair beside me. To this day, I don't know how long he had been sitting there praying for me. All I do know is that in his provision of a non-anxious presence, he was delivering a powerful sermon.

[Intercession is the intersection between failing faith and saving grace.]

I remember that moment, being stirred back to reality. The pain was real, and it wasn't just a bad dream. The wounds would leave a visible scar on my reputation, and my children would bear the brunt of explaining that their dad (however flawed) still walked on water. Still, no words spoken. He just looked at me with inexplicable grace. His lips slowly formed to a slight smile, as if to say, "I know. It hurts. I love you. And I 'like' you. I am not going anywhere. Go back to sleep."

We locked eyes for a moment, and I will never forget the blanket of comfort that covered me as I experienced agape love. I felt the love and acceptance of God, embodied in a friend - embracing my cold and broken hallelujah.

- Jay DePoy

Downtown Asheville Reflections, by Jay DePoy

A few days ago I took a walk through downtown Asheville. The winter rain left a visible fog, and although the temperature wasn't comforting, my love for this city kept me warm.

I stopped and talked to Happy, who greeted me with his usual hug. He's lost weight, but the cancer can't take away his smile! He seems to know each passerby personally, and they linger to hear about his latest adventure with the police department. We sat together and talked about where we've been and where we're going. He told me stories about running wild as a boy, setting Asheville on fire. And now, in his later years, he's doing the same...

I walked past the red bus, where I first saw the Light.

There was Pritchard Park, where I first saw the Love. I remember our first Friday night, the Drum Circle gathered the freak show, and the pulse of a desperate city vibrated for several blocks. I noticed a gathering of bullhorns and neon signs across the street, spreading the Good News of God's Hate. My three daughters were confused, obviously, because they have always heard about God's Love... So the next week we made some signs of our own, and handed out free water, and free hugs "in Jesus' Name".

I walked past Scully's, a downtown bar where on any given Monday evening you will find an eclectic gathering of atheists, agnostics, pagans, orthodox Christians, and post-labeled  "other". These evenings were filled with passionate dialogue around an Open Table between racial, religious, and political ideologies. And I used to sit and listen to the stories, and share my own... about how God radically rescued me from me, and took me from the basement of the Muskegon County Jail. I shared with them about the shame and hate and grace and forgiveness. To this day, I have retained many friends from this season... And I still get midnight phone calls, asking me to talk them down off the ledge.

And in the distance is the ABCCM Veteran's Quarters, housing over two hundred homeless veterans. I will never forget Bill, who had lost everything. He once had a six-figure salary and a big home in Wilmington. But when he was laid off, he spiraled into a depression that ate him alive, literally. The last time I saw him, we were standing on the sidewalk talking about God and heaven and hell. He asked me about the eternal destiny of those who commit suicide. After some silence, he put his hand into the shape of a gun and said, "Soon." A few days later, he went down to the Swannanoa River with a pistol and never came back.

The French Broad Chocolate Lounge, where Jamie and I used to linger over mocha and wine, telling jokes with no punch line, and playing footsies under the table. She used to order too much chocolate and then insist that I finish her dessert. And sometimes the live music was too loud for conversation, so we just looked at each other, and knew.

After collecting my thoughts, I sat on a park bench and gave thanks. For all of the ups and downs and lefts and rights and closed doors and opened windows and friends and enemies and concerned brothers and runaway rumors and baptisms and hugs and questions and doubts and the all-consumming hope that buries my heart, here.